Freshman year, my dorm was all single rooms—clearly, the giant, water-cooled mainframe computer that processed my application had enough smarts to know that a roommate, any roommate, would pose probably irreconcilable challenges for both of us. That’s a pretty crafty…

Let’s say you work for a very successful medium-sized company that makes highly specialized mechanical instruments. The company is like most others in the internal squabbles and wishy-washy leadership, so let’s leave that aside for now. That’s just working for…

Here’s something from my old blog about the switch back to standard time, written five years ago to mark this occasion, modified a bit. I’ll leave some but not all of the lefty political jabs in; it’s where I was…

You can get a big tray of ‘em for about $15 at every Home Depot, garden store, and even most grocery stores this time of year here in Zone 6. Probably elsewhere, too. They grow just about anywhere. They’re common,…

It was a beautiful, warm, sunny spring morning in Chicago. Monday never felt so good. There was so much change in the air for us. My job was going away in September, but a handful of us were on retainer…

Fresh from the city, the savvy kid knew what an alley was, and the thing these hick suburban kids were calling an alley was just a weedy path between the houses on the east side of McVicker and the west…

That first step into the bitter morning air stings that much harder upon the re-realization of your actual destination. Wherever you were going in the dream, you aren’t, says the sharpness in your nose, throat, and lungs. You would never…

For two years. For the dual crimes of being small and daring to do well at a school where stoners and dumbass jocks ruled. Do you remember “Dazed and Confused?” That should set the scene a bit for you. It’s…